So here we are, 17 weeks of grueling combat later and the dust has finally settled. Only one man in your league’s is left standing, hopefully it was you. I can honestly tell you that I was not at the top of the mountain this season. I could list several reasons why my season ended up in the crapper, but I don’t want to bore you.

What was that? Did I hear you correctly? You want to know about my 2009 fantasy football season? Well, if you insist. Instead of my usual rundown of the events of the past week, I will let you inside my season and explain to you what I thought was right, what I did wrong, and everything in between. I will focus on just one league for this piece, the league in which I did the worst. So strap yourselves in and get ready to re-live my 2009 season.

What Went Wrong

Trusting Jay Cutler

Cutler was one year removed from an epic 4,526 yd, 25 TD season with the Broncos. I honestly thought that moving to Chicago was not a big deal. Sure, he didn’t have a Pro Bowl caliber receiver on his team anymore, but it is great QB’s that make good receivers, right?

In this league, we require two starting QB’s, so quality QB’s were at a premium. I grabbed Cutler in the 3rd round, ahead of other standouts like Donovan McNabb and Matt Schaub. Cutler’s investment returned 3,666 yds, 27 TD and 26 INT.

Eddie Royal’s Sophomore Slump

I already said my piece back in October, but let’s just drive the point home.

Royal was coming off of a stellar rookie season with 91 receptions and 980 yds. With the hiring of Josh McDaniels as Denver’s head coach, I thought that Royal would become the new Wes Welker, catching short passes across the middle 7+ times per game.

Royal instead was Denver’s #2 wideout, and never set up in the slot. He became non-existent in the offense as soon as Kyle Orton fell in love with Brandon Marshall. I also failed to take into account that Kyle Orton is not the gun-slinging QB that Jay Cutler was in Denver.

This pick was really bad for me because Royal was my fifth rounder as well as my first WR off the board. I passed up on Brandon Marshall (to be fair, nobody knew if he would play at all) and DeSean Jackson for Royal.

FYI: Royal had no receiving TD this season.

The Injury to Anthony Gonzalez

Everyone’s favorite candidate for a major breakout season ended up disappointing us all before we could get our hopes up.

On the Colts’ first offensive drive of the season, Gonzalez sprained a ligament in his knee while blocking on a running play and was expected to miss up to eight weeks. Well, eight weeks turned into the entire season as Gonzalez left me with an empty hole at my WR position. Some 6th round pick that was!

Bernard Berrian Doesn’t Mix Well with Brett Favre

Favre’s return meant a lot of things. It meant the revival of his career, it meant the Vikings finished first in the NFC North, and it meant that Favre found a new favorite receiver.

Unfortunately it wasn’t Berrian, who was coming off back-to-back seasons of 950+ yds. In 2008, he averaged over 20 yds per catch…and that was with Tavaris Jackson! Instead of Favre elevating Berrian’s game, he elevated Sidney Rice’s game. Those 1,312 yds should have been Berrian’s dammit!

The Fall of the Giants Defense

I took the once intimidating Giants defense in the 8th round, making them the 3rd defense off the board. I should have been beefing up my bench, but I wanted a defense guaranteed to get me points each week.

According to our league settings, the Giants finished as the 25th best defense in our league. So much for those guaranteed points I needed.

Ronnie Brown’s Injury

I went with the old “RB-RB” strategy for my first two rounds. Brown was my 2nd round pick, and if you look at his week-to-week production, he was a letdown. Add that to the ankle injury that took him out in Week 10, and we have yet another missing piece of my puzzle.

The Silver Linings to My Season

Ricky Williams

Seriously, you didn’t think I’d draft Brown without handcuffing Williams with him did you? After taking over the full work load after Ronnie Brown’s injury, Williams rolled off four 100-yd efforts in eight games, averaging over 80 rush yds per contest. He ended the season with 13 total TD and he saved one of my RB positions.

Trusting in Maurice-Jones Drew

A lot of hype surrounded MJD before fantasy drafts. There were a lot of skeptics, including myself, who thought Jones-Drew wouldn’t adapt to a full work load.

He ended up finishing 4th in rushing yds (1,391) and 2nd in rushing TD (15). In addition to that, he kept up his all-around production with 53 receptions. There is no reason to think he won’t continue his domination next season.

Knowing I Did the Right Thing in the Draft

My season may have ended up in the crapper, but if it wasn’t for my WR core being polluted with injuries and unforeseen disappointments, I would have had a good year. If the receivers I drafted had just done what they did in the previous season, I would have been fine.

I drafted my RB’s, WR’s, and QB’s at the right time and I even handcuffed Ronnie Brown. I made the right moves with almost everyone I drafted with the exception of my defense and TE.

This was just a bad luck season. I will have very different results next year and I will draft the same exact way.

Oh, before I forget…

Sports of Boston Football League

In one of the saddest excuses for a championship game that I have ever seen, SoB’s KC took home the gold in a 77.26-48.64 win. It was a low scoring snoozefest put forth by supposedly the two best teams in the league. We’ll have to wait ’til next year for a better game.

Discussion

2 comments for “Fantasy Football Report: My 2009 Season”

Well such a low score is to be expected in Week 17 (except for Dev’s team)…especially considering almost the ENTIRE NFC (except for the Cowboys, Eagles, and Vikings — I didn’t have any players from these teams…) was playing for nothing!

I’ll take the title game win. I had some big victories on the way to the Championship round, so I deserved to earn the 29-point win despite scoring just 77 points. What happened to Dan?!?!?!